Lee, Christine Kim-eng

The urgency of teaching diverse learners is aptly demonstrated in many parts of the world as the ethnic, racial, class, and linguistic diversity grows rapidly. Such diversity not only brings about opportunities for creative teaching, but also challenges for ensuring educational equity and providing high-quality teaching for all students from diverse backgrounds, especially those presently underserved by the educational system (Buehl, & Beck, 2014; Civitillo, Juang, & Schachner, 2018). Researchers have found that teachers prepared for working with students from diverse cultural backgrounds need to embrace beliefs that recognize the strengths of cultural diversity (Anagnostopoulos, 2006; Banks et al., 2005; Fives & Buehl, 2014; Gay, 2010). Thus, exploring and challenging teachers’ beliefs about cultural diversity should constitute a major objective in teacher professional learning. However, only a few studies have examined how in-service teachers’ beliefs are enacted and shaped in professional learning community practices (Little, 2003; Tam, 2015; Turner, 2011), and focused even less on teachers’ beliefs about cultural diversity (Pang, 2005; Sleeter, 1992). There are a few studies examining teachers’ cultural beliefs about diversity in Singapore, and found that Singaporean teachers are influenced by prevailing political ideologies, and have ambiguous perceptions towards students from less advantaged backgrounds (Anderson, 2015; Alviar-Martin & Ho, 2011; Dixon & Liang, 2009; Ho & Alviar-Martin, 2010; Ho et al., 2014; Lim & Tan, 2018). However, these studies discussed teachers’ individual perceptions of disadvantaged learners without further exploring how these perceptions are mediated by influences from professional development practices, where teachers’ cultural beliefs about diversity issues are in (inter)action as ideas emerge, clash, change, and (dis)agree with each other when teachers work together.

This article explores the use of Structured Academic Controversies (SAC) in the teaching of secondary Social Studies. Social Studies as a subject abounds with many controversial issues ranging from local issues such as Singapore's separation from Malaysia and other issues like conflicts in Sri Lanka and Northern Ireland and the United Nations as a world organisation. An example of a Social Studies lesson which has been trialed in a neighbourhood school will be provided. Implications for the use of SAC in Social Studies classrooms will also be discussed.

The challenge of teaching science is to teach in a way that enables pupils to learn science concepts while acquiring process skills and positive scientific attitudes. One of the effective ways of accomplishing these objectives is through involving pupils in hands-on activities in the context of cooperative learning. The use of cooperative learning presents immense practical challenges to teachers. This paper is based on classroom observations of science teaching where teachers reported that they were using some form of cooperative learning. These classroom observations were part of a larger study which examined primary classroom practices in Singapore. Our classroom observations reveal that while group work is being carried out in Science lessons, few of the teachers have structured group learning according to the principles of cooperative learning. A challenge faced by teachers is the design of group tasks that will require higher-order thinking and promote real collaboration among group members.

This paper discusses two issues : (a) the implementaion of cooperative learning in a heterogenous primary classroom in Singapore and (b) a sociometric survey of friendship choices of the children before and after cooperative learning. The study was a pilot test using Kagan's cooperative learning structures in social studies lessons. Interviews with the children revealed positive responses to cooperative learning. Discipline and status problems are discussed. Sociometric data showed a rise in the proportion of children making cross-ethnic friendship choices after cooperative learning. The researchers believe that one of the strongest justifications for cooperative learning may come from the qualitative effects on pupil attitudes and values.

Many large-scale studies (Berman and McLaughlin 1975; Emrick and Peterson, 1978) and reviews (Fullan and Pomfret, ,1977) have indicated the need for curriculum developers to pay more attention to the process of implementing new curriculum materials. This study draws upon the tools of the Concerns-based Adoption Model developed by Hall and Loucks to gather information about teacher implementation behaviour in relation to the Curriculum Development Institute of Singapore (CDIS) Social Studies curriculum package. The Innovation Configurations checklist and an openended teacher-concerns questionnaire were ad~qinistered to 725 teachers from 70 primary schools .during two survey periods, March to May 1986 and July to September 1986. Analysis of the data provided understanding of teachers' actual use of the various components of the curriculum and their main concerns. Unacceptable and weak teacher practices were revealed in the fieldtrips, project work, testing and the teaching of concepts components of the curriculum package. In addition, teachers seemed more concerned about the content area of Social Studies rather than the skills which the curriculum package advocated. The data forms a basis for the development of more effective implementation-facilitating activities.

A challenge that schools face in the new millennium is to create in our classrooms learning communities where pupils are learning, exploring, talking and communicating within a positive classroom culture. Creating such classrooms requires a careful look at how teachers attempt to construct the learning environment. This paper reports on what teachers actually do in their classrooms, with special focus on how they use groupwork in their lessons. It is part of a wider study of classroom organization in Singapore primary schools. Approximately seventy classroom observations of English, Math, Science and Social Studies lessons were gathered. Based on these observations, vignettes of what took place were constructed. The vignettes mirror what the teachers did within the walls of the classroom and reflect their interpretation and personal methods of using groupwork or cooperative learning. The paper will report some of our data on interesting practices that were observed. These reflect how cooperative learning techniques were shaped by teachers, surprising moves and faltering implementation. The teachers used groupwork in different ways and were at different stages of comfort using its techniques. The paper will report on personal adaptations by teachers whose years of experience, beliefs and practical knowledge influenced how they planned and used groupwork. The study is a qualitative one. This paper will consist of the stories of lessons that featured interesting practices. Through this experience, we now have a better understanding of the process of implementation of the groupwork method in our schools.